


isizathu

by black_nata



Category: Black Panther (2018)
Genre: Bottom T'Challa (Marvel), M/M, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-17
Updated: 2018-02-17
Packaged: 2019-03-20 11:50:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13717083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/black_nata/pseuds/black_nata
Summary: "What do you want?" T'Challa whispers. Almost like he's pleading. All Erik wants to do is wrap his fist around that smooth throat and make him beg some more.





	isizathu

  
  
It starts off like this.  
  
Pain under his ribs, right under where his heart beats faster than he can count, fast and hard enough that it's all he can hear. Sounds just like a rifle going off. Streets ain't safe around here. His father said run, "Run if you hear a shot, you run back home where it's safe, where I can keep you safe, boy, alright?" but he's home now and his legs freeze and gunshots fill his head even though it's dead quiet outside.  
  
Dead. Red stains the floor. His heart, a beating drum with somebody's clawed fist around it, digging deep. It hurts, oh God, it hurts — _please, utata, please wake up,_  he hears himself say— and he never thought he'd have to see his own father like this.  
  
He saw Mikey's father once, Mikey who lived down by the corner shop and shot hoops with them on the weekends, he saw Mikey's dad on the ground after the cops came. It was dark and it looked like he was just sleeping in a rain puddle. He didn't know what death was back then, but he was crying anyway, crying all the way back home for no reason. He was just sleeping in a rain puddle, wasn't he?  
  
Ain't no mistaking it now. The lights are on. Bright, yellow lights that catch in the blood. So much blood, slick on his hands, his t-shirt, as he rocks himself back and forth with his dad in his arms. Is he crying? He can't tell. The claws dig deeper into his heart until it feels like he can't breathe. Sounds rush out of him, echo in the quiet of the night.  
  
He sits there 'til sunlight. His small hands stroking at his father's arms, trying to put some warmth back in, not knowing what else to do. Noise fills the streets. People yelling, cars honking.  
  
Cars. Flying cars. Dad told stories about flying cars, magic herbs that could turn men into panthers, ruling invisible kingdoms with beautiful sunsets spilling across the mountains. He used to think that was all made up. But there was a spaceship. There was a spaceship in the Oakland sky before he found his father like this, and suddenly, Erik feels the claw around his heart snap into place.  
  
It's the last time he feels hurt. The last time he feels anything at all.

  
  
—

  
  
Black ops get him feeling something. Having somebody's life in your hands will do that to you, heart beating out of sync 'til it starts to hurt. The claw under his ribs goes tight for a few precious minutes, its grip a strange comfort by now.  
  
Nothing but pain and his own pride left. Even then, pain is little, a small pinprick sensation no matter the size of the wound. Bullets and bombs feel the same, and knives feel like nothing. He misses the claw. Finds it every time he makes the shot, more so if he pictures Wakanda's sovereign on the enemy's face.  
  
Target practice. He gets plenty of it. He's already taken out more people than he can count by the time the idea of scarification comes to him. Why not? If he's gonna take back the kingdom, might as well have something to show for his efforts when he gets there.  
  
He starts off at the arms. High up where his team won't see and start asking questions. One dot per body, not counting group kills, 'cause there's only so much room to spare.  
  
Not a lot of privacy in the shit, so he keeps the tally in his head 'til he can find a moment to himself. Doing it alone ain't easy. He keeps the skin raised with a peg he grabbed off some Afghan villager's clothesline and cuts through it with a damn sewing needle from his med kit. Quick and easy.  
  
He fills an arm up in less than a month. The last dot goes over his pulse point, just below the wrist of his uniform. He sits on the dusty floor of a Ukrainian ghetto with the TV on and studies himself in the mirror.  
  
The fresh dot drips blood down his fingers. He smiles. Imagines the look on king T'Chaka's face when he sees all this, wonders what cry his son would make when Erik makes their whole clan nothing but raised dots on his own skin. King T'Chaka's son. His cousin. Set to inherit the panther's suit, the crown that was meant for him all along.  
  
He'll leave him for last. It'll be slow. Real slow, pliers-and-razorblades slow so everybody in Wakanda can hear his screams. So T'Challa can feel the pain he felt that quiet night in Oakland with his hands full of his father's corpse. Will he howl? Beg like the Ukrainian dignitary Erik cut into pieces only an hour ago, beg for his life and his family's, too?  
  
He hopes so. It'll be worth it. All the days spent trying to raise himself in the projects. Trying to survive gang wars, being harassed by cops every day of his life. All the days spent busting his ass at college, trying to be more than people the same color as him were expected to be.  
  
All because of what? His father's compassion?  
  
His fists clench. Before he can realize what he's done, the mirror is shattered. Shards are sticking out of his knuckles. The TV shows nothing but static.  
  
  
  
—  
  
  
  
" _...erupted into chaos as an explosion rattled the International Center in Vienna. Multiple casualties have been reported. A number has yet to be officially released, but we have just received word that among the dead is Wakanda's own King T'Chaka, who was giving the keynote address at the time..._ "  
  
He's only meant to take out the warlord. Cut the head of the snake, make it seem like it was done by another radical group, and give them incentive to start cleaning each other up so the U.S. military doesn't have to. He's only meant to keep it simple, but then that shit comes on the radio and Erik can't breathe.  
  
It's Oakland all over again. Something taken from him before he has the chance to get near. T'Chaka was his. T'Chaka was his, his to fill up with shrapnel, to torture and mutilate to his pounding heart's content. His, nobody else's.  
  
Erik stands in the middle of the village, heaving, gulping mouthfuls of air that don't seem to be going into his lungs at all. Smoke curls around him. Straw huts crackle in flames. He can't count the bodies. He was only meant to take out the warlord, but something in him snapped, and now blood is soaking the dirt, men and women and children, too, and the claw around his heart digs its vibranium talons deep.  
  
Can't remember when he started killing his own people. But it is what it is.  
  
He doesn't go to the extraction point. Strips off his uniform where he stands, drops it in the dirt along with his weapons. His skin is full of dots by now, from his chest all the way down to his calves, rippling like scales over his muscles. He's left a little spot empty, right at his ankles, where T'Chaka and his own were supposed to go.  
  
Dumbass. What the hell was he stalling for, all this time? Telling himself it ain't time yet, it ain't time 'cause he needs more practice, more, more, no matter how many dots, more 'til he can take on an army of Wakandans on heart-shaped herbs and come out on top. All that training and killing, the countless black ops, for what? Some white boy to take his kill?  
  
A thought crosses his mind. To hunt down the killer himself, doling out the punishment meant for T'Chaka on the fool, just so he can think straight. To quiet down the rage, even a little. He huffs out a breath and picks some clothes left drying on a line. The last thing he needs to do is waste more time. He takes nothing but rations and water out of his supplies and starts walking.  
  
Ulysses Klaue is exactly the kind of man Erik's hated all his life. Just another oppressor, sitting on stockpiled crates of vibranium on the African coast, shit that doesn't belong to him and still making it look like he's got every right to it.  
  
Erik pushes down the anger. He puts a smile on his face and acts like Klaue isn't his living, breathing ticket into Wakanda. Best friends forever. The enemy of my enemy, and all that.  
  
  
  
—  
  
  
  
He lets his hair grow out. Trades the military buzzcut for dreads, puts gold in his teeth like a panther's bottom canines, one step closer to his roots than ever. White people stare at him more, mall guards follow him around like he's planning on stealing something, and cops do what they do best.  
  
The thought of what's coming keeps him sane. The image of all these wannabe slave-drivers on their knees for once keeps him going, walking through the doors of the museum with his head bowed low, all compliance and submission. Even then, the guards start following him. He can't keep the insulted grin off his face for long.  
  
T'Challa's got no idea what's coming. The justice building up over a thousand years, now rushing towards him at full speed. Wakandans ain't nothing more than fellow conspirators. Guilty of the same crimes as the hands holding the whip. Guilty of negligence, of turning a blind eye, of taking a father's life and abandoning a child. All of that, reflected in a piece of vibranium locked behind glass.  
  
To see that artifact in Ulysses' grip makes the claw around his heart tighten. But it's all part of the plan.  
  
It's easy, then, to sit back and watch it all unfurl. He helps paint a big ol' bullseye on Ulysses' head and counts the hours down to when T'Challa finally takes the bait.  
  
When he does, it's easy to convince Ulysses he doesn't need Erik at the drop. The guy's ego is jacked. It hardly takes much to make him believe in his own skill, especially when he's got no idea the CIA ain't gonna be the only ones at the casino. As expected, he gets caught. And as expected, T'Challa doesn't go for the kill.  
  
The so-called king looks different in person. Not quite the same as on TV. Erik can barely see him through the smoke of the blast, through his own tribal mask, but without the sharp lens of a camera, T'Challa looks... soft. Big brown eyes, brow creased in worry. No violence in his gaze. Even when the panther suit morphs over him, and the air starts filling with static, Erik feels no rage from the man under the electrical charge.  
  
Behind the mask, Erik blinks. He swallows down concrete dust and feels the panther's claw carve new scars into his heart. Weak. T'Challa is weak. He lifts the rocket launcher to his shoulder with a growl and fires.  
  
There. T'Chaka's heir sprawled in the dirt, where he belongs. The last thing Erik sees as the van pulls away is T'Challa's childish stare locked on his necklace, on the royal ring hanging there, looking like the world just stopped spinning.  
  
  
  
—  
  
  
  
He hates T'Challa even more for it.  
  
Hates him for being so soft, so lenient. For having retained his innocence when Erik never got that luxury, stripped of his childhood faster than he could blink. In the same time, T'Challa was bathing in riches. Sitting comfortable, with two parents and a little sister, an uncle, while he had to walk the earth alone.  
  
He's counting on the people of Wakanda to hate him for it, too.

He lays Ulysses' body at W'Kabi's feet the way T'Challa never could and watches the loyalty shift in the man's eyes. Easy as pie. About time somebody showed up and made them see what a real king looks like. No soft looks or soft politics, no more standing by and letting tyrants walk all over their brothers and sisters across the globe.  
  
"What do you want?" T'Challa whispers.  
  
His voice is feather-soft. Almost like he's pleading. He can feel its air against his cheek, warm and gentle, like the rest of him. All Erik wants to do is wrap his fist around that smooth throat and make him beg some more. Make him beg right in front of his momma, his little sister, in front of everybody who could have done something for the world and instead did nothing, make him beg right before he crushes his windpipe.  
  
"I want the throne," he says, and nothing feels as good as looking into T'Challa's startled eyes even as the council laughs.  
  
The fear never leaves. T'Challa already knows he's been beat, even before Erik pulls his shirt off and shows them what he's been doing ever since they left him in Oakland like trash. If he had time, he'd give T'Challa a cut for every raised dot and let him bleed out on the falls, slow and humiliating.  
  
But he can't help himself. He's waited his entire life for this moment, been starved for it since day one without his father. The hunger pushes him, wraps its claws around his heart, his lungs, his everything and Erik growls as he thrusts the spear deep into T'Challa's stomach.  
  
It ain't enough. None of it. Not the scream T'Challa gives, not the sight of him on his knees. In dreams, he's pulled the black panther apart with a million tools, extended his pain into oblivion. It ain't enough, killing him like this, never enough to feed the vengeance, but the Dora Milaje look like they might step in any minute and tip the scales. Wakandan loyalty's as fickle as its morals. He raises the weapon high.  
  
In the end, Zuri's death makes T'Challa cry in a way no tool could have.  
  
Erik laughs, the panther in him fed and sated. He hoists the broken, mewling cat over his shoulders and throws him to the void. If a bitter taste floods his mouth afterwards, Erik chalks it up to the blood running down his face.  
  
  
  
—

 

He takes the kingdom. Drinks the heart-shaped herb. Takes the power of the Golden Jaguar for himself and still, the claw around his heart won't let go.

The rage in him lashes out like a panther, more violent than before. Why'd his father look so sad in the vision? Why'd he look disappointed? He's brought justice to Wakanda, to the whole world. Erik grits his teeth and lifts the medicine woman off her feet with a hand around her throat. This is how a king should rule. Ain't no softness to be found here. Just an iron fist, thrust high into the heavens for everybody to see.  
  
Why, then, does nothing feel right?  
  
He should have kept T'Challa alive. Kept him caged up like the West did to their ancestors, showed him what Wakanda let their people suffer through for centuries with each passing day. Maybe that would have felt right. It would have felt like real justice, world justice, and maybe, it would have laid his father's spirit to rest.  
  
He watches the herb garden go up in flames and still feels nothing. Watches carriers full of Wakandan weapons take flight and orders more to be deployed because the rage in him persists, hot like the goddamn tears he saw running down his father's face in the astral plane. Why'd he look so sad? Erik wants to reach into his own chest and chop the claw clean off, chop his heart out with it if he can, throw it over the falls with T'Challa's rotting body.

Only T'Challa ain't down there. He's staring right at him.  
  
In the distance, he's no bigger than one of the dots carved into Erik's skin. If he'd had the time, he would have given himself one with T'Challa's name on it. Now, doing it doesn't seem right. Not when the prince is still alive. Erik should have known. Roaches don't die easy.  
  
The little dot walks like it's as tall as Mount Bashenga, strong as the vibranium mines beneath. He can't explain the smile on his own face at the sight of him. Must be the prospect of killing him twice, the chance to make T'Challa suffer, really suffer this time, using the whole black ops bag of tricks.  
  
"That's a hell of a move."  
  
Seems like the cat's got tricks of his own. Erik looks down at the dagger sticking out of his chest, right through his jaguar habit and, for the first time in decades, he feels the claw around his heart let go.  
  
He looks up at T'Challa. Expects to find self-righteous contentment on his face, but when he meets that soft gaze, the violence rushes out of him completely. T'Challa's got a look on his face like he's defeated. Even though Erik's the one with vibranium right through his core.  
  
He can barely feel it. The gentle touch T'Challa lays on his shoulders feels more present than that, more real, more painful.  
  
He doesn't get why. He would've killed the prince twice just for the fun of it, killed his whole family, too, had they not fled, and now T'Challa is pulling him to his feet and carrying him under the belly of the panther where he can die in peace.  
  
And T'Challa can't even let him do that. He looks at him with brown eyes too kind to belong to a king and offers mercy, offers life, when nobody else would have given Erik the choice, if they had the power. Erik wouldn't have given anybody the choice, himself. Not even to his own blood.  
  
There's only one way to go about this. He reaches for the knife in his heart and pulls. He almost regrets it, 'cause T'Challa makes a small noise like the life's fleeing from him too, but one minute of freedom is better than a lifetime in chains, and the last thing he sees before his eyes close is T'Challa's kind face over him, soft and gentle, framed by the warm orange glow of the Wakandan sunset.  
  
  
  
  
—  
  
  
  
"What are you doing, hmm? Go on, get out of there. Let the poor man be."  
  
He wakes up to the sound of kids giggling. His limbs, numb. Weak. Feels like a dream. For a moment, he thinks he's back in Oakland, sprawled out on the basketball court looking at the clouds, waiting for the older neighborhood kids to finish shooting hoops so he and his friends can take a turn.  
  
Then, his eyes open. Ain't no clouds over his head. Just a straw roof, like those huts at the village in Somalia where he was only meant to take out the warlord—  
  
Erik shoots up fast enough to make the world spin. His heart beats loud under his ribcage. His heart, he gasps, hands frantically touching his chest. No wound. Nothing but scar dots. But he died. He was dead, blade right through the heart, and now he's in one of the huts he burned to the ground.  
  
This must be hell, then. Somebody looking just like him is gonna come blazing in here and fire off a whole clip in his chest, the same way he did to those villagers in Somalia. This is how he's gonna spend the afterlife. Being the victim of his own crimes. He huffs out a breath, laughter punching out of him. Alright then. It is what it is.  
  
"I was beginning to worry you would never wake."

The last thing he expects to see is T'Challa's unmistakable silhouette in the doorway. Erik can't see his face with the way the sun frames the back of his head, though he can hear the smile in his voice clear enough.  
  
He bites down on his own tongue. Words won't serve him now. What's he supposed to say, anyway? Give thanks to the man who saved his life, or cuss him out for disregarding his dying wishes? He sits there, breathing harsh, fists clenching and unclenching over and over. The claw around his heart is gone, and somehow, he feels lonely without it.  
  
His hands shake. Before he can control himself, he rushes to his feet and has T'Challa by the throat.  
  
T'Chaka and his whole line have taken everything from him. His father, his title, his culture. Hell, they've even taken death from him. There ain't nothing left in this world for him to call his own. No riches, no possessions. If he's lucky, he might be able to hold onto his sanity for a little while, but with the way he's squeezing the air out of T'Challa, he reckons it's already gone.  
  
What's even more infuriating is T'Challa doesn't fight back. He keeps his arms hanging limp at his sides like they're broken, 'til Erik squeezes harder and the tears slip free. Then, and only then, does he wrap a hand around his wrist.  
  
"N'Jadaka," he says. Soft and pleading. Always pleading.  
  
Erik rips his hand away before the touch infects him. Before the weakness seeps under his own skin like malaria and there ain't no way to get it out.

"That's not my name, cuz," he spits. "Not anymore. Yo' daddy made sure of that."  
  
He watches T'Challa gasp lungfuls of air in the silence. That's gonna leave a nice bruise around his collar. Paw prints for all to see. He should have pressed harder. Ended him, the way he's always wanted to. Just to stop T'Challa from looking at him like that, big brown eyes full of tears, full of pain and guilt and unspoken apologies.  
  
He ain't ever seen this much guilt in somebody's eyes. Not in dictators looking down into the barrel of a rifle, begging for their lives to be spared, not in lifelong killers who long for death so much they ask for it nicely. He should feel nothing but pleasure, looking at T'Chaka's golden son like this. For some reason, the feeling slips through his fingers, elusive as ever.  
  
T'Challa leaves quickly, without another word.  
  
The next time Erik sees him, it's been a week. T'Challa sits on the rocks by the water, staring at his hands, doing nothing else. He sits there for an hour before he gets up and walks towards the hut. Erik can see him through a chink in the clay-straw walls. He walks towards the hut and then stops in his tracks, wrapping his arms around himself like he's still a kid, and Erik has to look away for a minute, swallowing lumps.  
  
When he looks back, T'Challa's not there anymore.  
  
  
  
—

 

The fishermen must not know who he is. That's the reason they don't murder him where he stands, Erik thinks, as soon as he steps out of the hut. It might be that he's got himself covered up head to toe, ritual scars hidden from sight, any indication of who he is and what he's done lost under multicolored fabrics.  
  
He only strips down to clean up, scrubbing at himself in the river with salt soap like he can wash the dots off. He ain't really trying to. He's not ashamed of them, of what they represent. It's just that...  
  
They itch sometimes, that's all.  
  
The fishermen leave a little something every time they come. Not too often, just enough to keep the village fed for half a week or so. Back in Oakland, fish was a treat. Right up there with Sunday roast, a straight up luxury. His father grilled a mean salmon, when he could get his hands on it.  
  
Erik puts his plate down. The memory tightens his throat, makes it hard to swallow. Can't help that every time he thinks of his father, he remembers what he saw after drinking the heart-shaped herb. The sorrow in his father's eyes. The regret.  
  
He doesn't sleep at night. Might doze off a second, before snapping back to as though he's back in the shit, trying to stay awake on night watch.  
  
It helps if he pretends like he is, instead of admitting what's really going on. He's become the last thing he ever wanted to be. A prisoner, plain and simple. No use calling it anything else. He might have no chains holding him down, but he ain't stupid enough to think he can come and go as he pleases like the fishermen.  
  
He leans back in his soft pallet. He misses the noise. The sound of cars honking, bombs dropping in the distance, even. He hasn't been on his own like this since he lost everything, and even then, Oakland was never this quiet. Never made him feel so alone. Trapped in collapsed Afghan caves, he never felt so cut off from the world.  
  
Erik catches himself before he goes too deep. He scoffs at the nothingness around him. Getting stabbed in the heart must have knocked something loose there, messed up the proper balance, made him soft.  
  
When the fishermen come again, they leave more that a little something behind. The white boy makes himself comfy in the hut next to his, and Erik didn't know T'Challa was letting in tourists through the borders now, dressing them up in river tribe colors like they belong.  
  
It's only when he gets a closer look at the man that he realizes who he is.  
  
Is this how it is now? T'Challa gonna keep a collection of every broken man he finds? He planning on filling up these huts with people he waged war against, or is it just the two of them? There's a third hut on the shore. At this point, he wouldn't be surprised to find Helmut Zemo sitting in there one day, straw basket full of fish and fruit in his lap like Barnes.  
  
For a killer, Barnes seems awful tender. He's got that same softness in his eyes as T'Challa does, the same quiet pain, and Erik doesn't want to think about what that might mean. He watches Barnes tuck his straw basket under his only remaining arm and walk over to the edge of the water where he's dipping his toes. From the look on the man's face, he already knows who Erik is. There's recognition, alright. No fear, no rage, but if Barnes is the living legend Erik's read about in classifieds, he can mask that shit at whim.  
  
"They cooked up a big old carp for us," Barnes says in a voice too small to belong to his body, setting down the basket on the flat boulder between them. "They put strawberries in there, too. Think it might be a goodbye present."  
  
"Leaving the party already?" he asks, and grabs an apple.  
  
"Me?" Barnes is shaking his head. "No. I'm staying a while. Got a few things I gotta figure out."  
  
Erik freezes mid-bite. He carries on a second later, plays it off like it ain't a thing, though his heart starts beating faster under his ribs. If he's not the one leaving, then...  
  
Yeah. He should have seen this coming. T'Challa letting him live when he asked for death, keeping him here when he could have thrown him from the Warrior Falls with a knife stuck in his breast. Erik feels his lips twist around his mouthful. He should've known. Apples and trees. T'Challa's just like his father, sly and cunning as a brush panther. He's kept him alive for the same reason he did Zemo.  
  
To stand trial. To be chained up and caged, just like his ancestors. Erik should've expected nothing less from a Wakandan.  
  
"Everybody's been talking about you, y'know," Barnes says, trying to pull the fish apart with one hand. "It's all they do. Took a lot of convincing on T'Challa's part. He's been pleading with the council for weeks. Must really be something, being able to go back to your ancestral home. You wanna help me with this or what?"  
  
He gapes at the piece of fish in front of him. He had something real smart on the tip of his tongue a minute ago, but now he can barely get his jaw to unlock. He takes the fish out the basket with both hands and rips it apart without another word. They sit in silence and watch the river ripple in the warm breeze. Erik can't find it in himself to spoil the quiet asking how or why.  
  
  
  
 —

 

The punching bag bleeds sand on his sneakers. He stands in the middle of his rooms and watches it pour. His rooms, plural, with an 's', 'cause T'Challa couldn't give him just one, T'Challa with big brown eyes crinkling at the edges as he smiled and walked him into the palace, he couldn't just let him be in the little hut, he had to bring him here in all these riches.  
  
He hangs another bag on the hook and starts over. Hits 'til his knuckles bleed through the tape, trying to make himself angry for sitting here comfortable while his brothers and sisters wake up hungry day after day in the 'hood.  
  
No matter how many punches he throws, it ain't enough to bring the rage back. To put the panther's claw around his heart and give himself a reason to go to work on these traitors, on all the traitors in the world. Still plenty of War Dogs all over to make it work. Sleeper cells waiting for somebody to give the order, set the balance right.  
  
He finds himself tired in the aftermath. Just tired, nothing more. Dizzy with the effort. And every time he breathes, he sees his father's face staring back at him, tears streaming down his cheeks.  
  
They must have put something in his food. In his water. Something to keep him pliant, keep him from running when he gets the chance. He's free to go, T'Challa said. Free, though it doesn't feel like he is, invisible chains holding him down every time he looks at T'Challa's face and sees pain.  
  
Maybe he stays just to see that. Not 'cause he feels bad, but because it's too good to pass up. It's all he ever wanted. All he prayed for since he was little, holding his father's weight in his arms and vowing to shed blood for blood. He swore he'd make T'Chaka feel sorry, make his whole family tree feel it, too, and now, that's all his son seems to feel. Sorrow.  
  
If Erik feels it too, it's 'cause of his own father. The thought of what happened to him, the injustice. T'Challa's excessive, unwarranted guilt ain't got nothing to do with it.  
  
"I think that one is dead, N'Jadaka," a low voice says.  
  
Erik turns to find T'Challa looking at the torn punching bag hanging from the ceiling. Fresh out the throne room, still wearing the robes with the purple and gold stitching. A true king. He scoffs. Turns his focus back to the task so he doesn't have to look at the smirk on T'Challa's mouth, hear that gentle tone.  
  
If he hits a little harder on the next throws, ain't nobody gonna call him out on it. He's not putting on a show, just letting the king know what's up.  
  
T'Challa stands in the doorway and keeps watching him. One foot in, one foot out, like he can't decide between running or stepping up, pleading, always pleading, with the regal arch of his spine bowed slightly, pulling his shoulders in and trying to make himself small. Erik's used that technique in the shit, with guys a lot scarier than him that he knew he couldn't beat in a fight.  
  
He's used it on little kids, too. Terrified little Iraqi girls that wouldn't even trust the evac team trying to save them. He's made himself small and used a soft voice like T'Challa is now, plied them to the safety of a chopper with chocolate bars and kept himself like that all the way back to base, just so he doesn't scare a single one of them.  
  
The thought that T'Challa might be treating him like a traumatized little kid works wonders for his rage.  
  
"So you gon' stand there and watch all day?" he shouts, way louder than he intended. "I got a kendo stick right here with your name on it. You either pick it up or shut the door when you leave, 'cause this ain't a peep show,  _your majesty_."  
  
T'Challa doesn't flinch. He strips to his bare basics without further prompt and Erik can't help looking at the scar on his stomach, on the inside of his thigh, all put there by none other than himself. He has to rip his gaze away before T'Challa sees, walking over to the training weapons rack and throwing a stick at him.  
  
T'Challa catches it. Inspects it. Runs hands too rough to catch in splinters over the wood. Then he throws the stick aside. There's a grin on his face as the black panther pulls his fists up.  
  
"Oh, it's like that, huh?" Erik laughs. "And here I was, thinking you was just a pu—"  
  
T'Challa knocks the air right out of him. Erik didn't even see him move. Oh. Right. For a minute there, he forgot heart-shaped herbs were a thing, thought he was fighting a brother fair and square. He ends up on his back staring at the ornate ceiling before he can blink, T'Challa's solid weight between his thighs pinning him to the ground.  
  
He's laughing. T'Challa is laughing, warm breath washing over Erik's face. He can feel the rumble of it deep in his chest, the way it's pressed up against his own. T'Challa laughs and laughs until he goes quiet all of a sudden, and they stay there frozen, laying on top of each other like it ain't nothing but a regular thing.  
  
His throat goes dry. It burns hot wherever T'Challa's bare skin touches his. Ain't no doubt T'Challa can feel the way his heart starts thumping, pumping blood faster than his body can take, like it's about to burst out of his pores. It takes a while to notice anything but that. Then, he feels the hand in his hair. Just resting there. Laying feather touches on his dreadlocks.  
  
Erik jumps.  
  
"Man, get off me," he barks, using everything he's got to throw T'Challa to the side.  
  
He stands up with his hands curled into fists. Stands up over T'Challa's prone body, looming over him with his full height like he plans on doing something stupid enough to have the Dora Milaje running in here and killing his ass.  
  
From his spot on the floor, T'Challa stares with wide eyes. He says nothing. Doesn't have to. The shame is written there plainly, heavy on his brow like a dark crown. Erik doesn't wait for him to pick himself up. He rushes out the doors of his own private gym before either of them can speak, before either can acknowledge what just happened.  
  
He decides, laying in his bed that same night, doing a good job of not falling asleep, that the next time he sees T'Challa is gonna be the last. No more playing games. He's putting the cat down and doing what he was supposed to do all along, what his people always needed and never had the strength to do on their own. He's not gonna sit here no more and let T'Challa turn him soft.  
  
Then, he turns on the TV. Finds T'Challa on the breaking news, telling the world the truth like Erik always wanted, 'cause sharing is caring, and Erik throws the remote right through the hologram and watches it break apart on the vibranium wall.  
  
  
  
—  
  
  
  
It starts off like this.  
  
Pain under his ribs, right under where his heart beats faster than he can count, fast and hard enough that it's all he can hear. Sounds just like a rifle going off. He runs through the fields without looking back, the way his father said he should when the shots go off, and feels the claws come out with a snap of his wrists.  
  
It's quick work. A swipe here, a kick there. Bodies go flying in the blue sky and he's letting these fools know what happens when they take something that's his. Everybody in the whole universe better know it. Erik's got an empty spot on his ankle where the black panther's dot is meant to go. The cat is his. His to mess with, his to kill. And some bald, ugly, purple space colonizer can't do a goddamn thing about it, him or his freak army.  
  
He finds T'Challa sprawled out in the dirt when the fight's over. Panther habit ripped, blood pouring out in streams, and all Erik sees is his own father laying there instead, quiet and cold.  
  
Shuri eyes him while she works. He sits in the corner snacking on dried fruit, still in his Golden Jaguar suit, and listens to the low hum of the regeneration chamber with T'Challa's little sister throwing him dirty looks every now and then. Wakandans don't trust easy. But then again, she has plenty of reason not to. The last time he saw her, he had a sword poised over her head, ready to bring it down without a moment's delay.  
  
"This might take a while," she says, breaking the silence. "I'll call you when he wakes."  
  
He huffs out a breath. Gulps down the last pieces of fruit and gets to his feet, trying hard to ignore the strange flip of his stomach when he sees T'Challa laying there useless behind glass.  
  
He's halfway out the lab when Shuri's suddenly shouting, "And put the necklace back where you found it, N'Jadaka! Don't make me send the Dora Milaje after you," and he drops the fanged chain in a snack bowl by the door on his way out.  
  
A week passes. Rains come and wash the fields clean of red and blue blood. He spends more time getting familiar with the punching bags, turning his knuckles raw past midnight into dawn. T'Challa's still under. Still under and Erik swears he feels the old claw wrap around his heart again, waiting for a sign of weakness to sink itself deep.  
  
It goes on like that some more. He punches sandbags for days and when he can barely feel his hands anymore, he runs. Wears the treadmill down to nothing. He won't let himself sleep. Tells himself it ain't nothing but anger at the thought of T'Challa slipping away from him the same way T'Chaka did, slipping quick and easy before Erik can make him pay his dues. Nothing but anger, deep in his core, filling his guts up so he can't even eat.  
  
He wakes up one day and doesn't even remember falling asleep. Passed out on the couch in his bedroom with a blanket thrown over him, and he definitely doesn't remember doing that.  
  
"Shuri says you saved my life."  
  
Erik takes a sharp breath. He stands faster than his burning thighs allow. He blinks, just in case it's a dream, like the ones he used to have after his father died where he kept seeing his ghost on the walls, in the kitchen, packing him lunch for school.  
  
But T'Challa's here, sure as night. Sure as the burning rage he feels when he sees those big brown eyes smiling at him, full of softness and innocence and all the things he never had.

"You got some nerve," he growls. Can't tell why he says it, only that it feels right. "You got some nerve, tryin' to die on me. All the things I did just so I could kill you, and you think I'm gonna let you slip through my fingers just like that, cuz?"  
  
The smile slips from T'Challa's face. He opens his mouth to speak, and Erik can't have that, he can't have none of that, so he rushes T'Challa 'til he's got him up against the wall with a hand around his throat. A little surprise goes a long way. T'Challa stays frozen like an antelope in headlights, mouth hanging open where the words didn't have time to come out.  
  
"You ain't going nowhere," he breathes in T'Challa's startled face. "Ain't nobody laying hands on you but me, you hear? You're mine. You're m—"  
  
He should already know by now. T'Challa's a tricky one. Sly as a brush panther, and mean like one, too, though he seems soft so often Erik forgets he has claws.  
  
He's soft now. Lips soft against his own, moans soft, vibrating between them. But the rest of him ain't. One hand holds Erik's head in place, rough in his locks, while the other slips under his t-shirt and runs over his scars. T'Challa takes what he wants like a king. Takes everything he has and more, leaves him shivering and desperate like he ain't ever been before.  
  
Erik rips himself away.  
  
He turns, walks away, running a hand over his face, shaking his head 'cause this can't be happening, this can't be happening, hell, no, but T'Challa chases him down like a panther does to prey, claws deep in his shoulders and sends them both tumbling down on the dark fur carpet.  
  
"Why do you fight, N'Jadaka?" T'Challa pants, chest heaving. "Give yourself what you want."  
  
Erik finds himself gulping as T'Challa pins his arms over his head. Then, he has the gall to sit in Erik's lap like he belongs there. Like it's his own personal throne, made to fit. Erik growls. He reaches out. Pulls T'Challa close by the back of the neck, by his short curls, 'cause if this is how it's gonna be, he might as well take charge. He swallows T'Challa's hiss with his mouth and swears he tastes vibranium on his tongue, smells it in the charged air all around.  
  
It doesn't take much to flip them over and have T'Challa sprawled beneath him. Even without the heart-shaped herb running through his veins, he can give T'Challa a run for his money. Can keep T'Challa trapped with nothing but a mouth on his jugular, wet lips kissing his hammering pulse.  
  
"Please," he hears T'Challa moan.  
  
Erik breathes in deep. Sudden. His own violent desire taking him by surprise. His whole body trembles at the sound. For years, he's thought of nothing but making T'Chaka's golden boy beg, of having him laid out on his back for his own pleasure. Never imagined this is how he'd get it. Not with tools and knives, but like this, pressed good and hard between his spread thighs, watching him throw his head back and sigh.  
  
"C'mere," he says, and it's something, the eager way T'Challa complies. Teeth sinking into Erik's bottom lip, just shy of drawing blood. He wishes T'Challa would. One more reason to rip those gold and purple robes right off and take him apart. Right here, on the floor, T'Challa's darkened eyes matching the fur beneath.  
  
It's easier said than done. Vibranium fabrics don't rip. He's gotta go through the painstaking effort of popping the buttons one by one as T'Challa squirms like a heat just hit him, hands clawing at Erik's own shirt, coordination straight out the window.  
  
When Erik's fingers reach his waistband, T'Challa goes still. Erik looks at his face. Watches him breathe out his nose, lips pressed together. Losing his nerve. Erik blinks. He leans back on his knees so he can give him some space, but T'Challa catches him with a hand wrapped around his wrist. They stay there like that, staring at each other in the overwhelming quiet.  
  
"This is..." T'Challa starts, his voice rough. Something possessive rears its head inside Erik. He did that. He did that to the king. Brought the black panther low. He watches T'Challa's throat bob, still wet with his spit, as he says, "We have the same blood running through our veins," and Erik can't help the smirk.  
  
"Really?" he chuckles. "That's our only problem here? The fact that we almost killed each other twice ain't that much of a dealbreaker, I guess, but you ain't gonna let me fuck you over just that one reason? 'Cause I can think of a few more."  
  
T'Challa's eyes slide shut at the words. Laughter bursts out of his mouth, eyes crinkling and dimples on full display, and damn, Erik's never seen that up close before. He leans back in 'til they're pressed flush against each other again, just to sear that image in his brain. Keep it forever like a grudge, and God knows he's good at keeping those.  
  
It takes a split second to strip. So it seems, burning inside out by the time he looks down and sees T'Challa bare, pressing fingers deep into himself before Erik gets the chance to get his heart beating in sync again. If T'Challa didn't get the chance to kill him earlier, he will now, just with the sight of him.  
  
He wobbles to his feet and goes for the ointment in his bedside drawer, 'cause the way it's going, T'Challa's gonna hurt himself, hurt Erik just by looking at him with those pleading brown eyes. It's easy then, to drop to his knees and take T'Challa's cock in his mouth. Easy to work him open, to fit himself against the backs of the panther's thighs and watch him writhe in place, muscles rippling under dark, glowing skin. Ocean water in an earthquake. That's what it feels like. An earthquake. Like the whole world's breaking to pieces, tumbling down and letting something else rise in its place.  
  
When did he get so sentimental? Soon as he asks himself, the answer comes back quick. He squeezes his eyes to block out the thought. The image of Oakland's hot streets, a tall building over which a spaceship floats. He presses his lips hard and ruthless against T'Challa's own and thrusts in deep, can barely hear the loud, startled groan over the sound of blood rushing in his ears.  
  
T'Challa leaves claw marks down his back. Feels like he's cutting through the raised dots. There was a time he would have questioned the man's ability to assume the black panther's mantle, but damn. Ain't no question about it now. Erik buries his face in T'Challa's neck to hide the way his brow creases, to muffle the low sound ripped from his throat. Just when he thinks he can get away with it, T'Challa traps him with those strong thighs and flips them over.  
  
Rough hands balance on his breast. Over a hundred ritual scars, over the place T'Challa once ran him through with vibranium.  
  
Erik sucks in a breath. Before he can let it out, tight heat sinks down on him. He sees T'Challa choke on a gasp, mouth open and back arched, looking no different than the time he had a spear in his stomach.  
  
He blinks the sweat from his eyes. It's different, though, ain't it? No hurting here but the good kind. A battle they can both win, for once, together and against each other and inside out. He comes with that thought on his mind, and a warrior king grinding down on his lap, taking his own release until the both of them can't breathe no more.  
  
  
  
—  
  
  
  
"T'Challa," he says one day, looking out on the water.  
  
The straw huts glow orange. Soon, the sun's gonna dip beyond sight, plunging Wakanda in darkness, and the foreign mercenaries sitting strapped on the borders will start pouring in from all sides for a shot at the kingdom's high tech, for its mountain full of vibranium.  
  
Ain't no thing about it. It is what it is. Erik felt it coming years ago, saw it in his mind's eye, 'cause oppressors are typical like that, always wanting to take shit that don't belong to them and acting like they got every right doing it. Everybody should have listened when he warned them. Sooner or later, the world catches up. But sometimes the truth is a hard pill to swallow.  
  
T'Challa stands on the rocks with his shoulders hunched. The sunset catches in his armor, turns pale vibranium to smoldering gold. Even with the Black Panther habit on, he looks small. Vulnerable. Pride hurt, trust and hope in the world put to the test. Lost in his head. So deep in thought, he doesn't even hear Erik calling his name.  
  
"T'Challa," he says again, louder the second time. Brown eyes lock on him. Erik swallows the lump and says, " _Nceda ndixolele_. For everything I did to you."  
  
The brown eyes widen. Erik looks away before he can get choked up. Can't remember the last time it felt like this, and yeah, he does, sitting in the dark trying to put life back in his father's cold form. Something in his heart must've got knocked loose when he pulled the knife out of his own chest. He doesn't know what to call it besides a claw, but that vicious kind of thing ain't got a name. He ain't ever want it taking over him again.  
  
The moon is out. Panthers are nocturnal creatures, hunting best under the cover of night. These mercenaries ain't got a clue what's coming. Erik touches the fanged chain around his neck. The habit washes over him, and the last thing he sees before the mask of the Golden Jaguar closes over his face is the Black Panther standing tall, looking at him with a smile playing at the corners of his mouth.  
 

**Author's Note:**

> isizathu — n. (xhosa, zulu)  
> 1\. purpose  
> 2\. reason


End file.
